Various medical procedures require that one or more medical fluids be injected into a patient. For example, medical imaging procedures oftentimes involve the injection of contrast media into a patient, possibly along with saline and/or other fluids. Other medical procedures involve injecting one or more fluids into a patient for therapeutic purposes. Power injectors may be used for these types of applications.
A power injector generally includes what is commonly referred to as a powerhead. One or more syringes may be mounted to the powerhead in various manners (e.g., detachably; rear-loading; front-loading; side-loading). Each syringe typically includes what may be characterized as a syringe plunger, piston, or the like. Each such syringe plunger is designed to interface with (e.g., contact and/or temporarily interconnect with) an appropriate syringe plunger driver that is incorporated into the powerhead, such that operation of the syringe plunger driver axially advances the associated syringe plunger inside and relative to a barrel of the syringe. One typical syringe plunger driver is in the form of a ram that is mounted on a threaded lead or drive screw. Rotation of the drive screw in one rotational direction advances the associated ram in one axial direction, while rotation of the drive screw in the opposite rotational direction advances the associated ram in the opposite axial direction.
Radio frequency identification (“RFID”) tags are becoming more popular in various applications. RFID tags have been addressed in relation to medical applications, and specifically in relation to power injectors. For instance, RFID tags have been attached to power injector syringes and encoded with at least certain medical information. In many cases, power injector syringes are disposable (i.e., designed for only a single injection), and therefore, the entire syringe, including any associated RFID tag, is disposed of after use.